Instead, condo owners spokesman Tony Gioventu said the government should go after buildings with empty units built for speculators and investors

Eliminating a strata council’s ability to ban owners from renting their units won’t result in adding any additional suites, according to the executive director of the Condominium Home Owners Association.

Tony Gioventu said changing the law would only displace people who were currently living in the units, such as owners or family.

“I don’t think it will provide any housing whatsoever,” he said.

Gioventu was responding to the release Wednesday of the provincial government’s Rental Housing Task Force. The number one recommendation was to ban renovictions, which is defined as evicting tenants to renovate and then renting the suite out at a higher rent.

Of the report’s 23 recommendations, number 9 would eliminate a strata corporation’s ability to ban rentals. The report says this would “increase the availability of currently empty strata housing.

“While the Task Force believes this change will help to increase the rental housing supply, it is also important to give strata corporations the ability to evict tenants in exceptional cases where negligence, abuse or law breaking is disrupting the quiet enjoyment of other residents, putting people in danger, or harming the building,” the report states.

The previous Liberal provincial government changed the Strata Property Act on Jan. 1, 2010 to allow a developer not only to specify in their rental disclosure statement how many units can be rented and for how long, but also that a strata corporation can’t change it.

The change was supposed to allow owners to generate cash from their investments, according to then Housing Minister Rich Coleman.

“One of the biggest complaints we got, frankly — I heard from people who were Asian investors who bought units in Vancouver on the basis of they thought they could rent them out, that they could have some cash flow towards their investments, which they were going to hold,” he told The Vancouver Sun in July, 2010.

“After they bought them, along came a strata corporation and said: ‘Those rentals are no longer allowed here.’”

But Gioventu estimated that most empty suites are in the 180,000 strata units built since 2010.

Strata corporations formed before 2010 can adopt bylaws to limit or prohibit rentals. But he estimated that about 95 per cent already permit some form of rentals — usually from five to 10 per cent of all units. He said it was the “rare strata” that prohibits all rentals.

He said that in 2017 the City of Vancouver and the B.C. government asked his organization what would happen if the bylaw banning rentals was rescinded.

To find out, CHOA studied 16 buildings in Greater Vancouver with 50 or more units. Eight dated from after 2010 where there were no rental restrictions; and eight before 2010.

“The buildings that had rental bylaws that were pre 2010 had the lowest vacancy rate,” he said.

“Right across the board, they were below two per cent. So people are occupying the units or have family members occupying the units.”

Less than two per cent meant in essence that there were no vacant units in buildings with rental bylaws.

In the buildings built since 2010, he said, vacancy rates were between 20 and 35 per cent.

“Those are the buildings that should be targeted and the rental bylaws have absolutely nothing to do with them,” Gioventu said.

“The main reason is because the units themselves are used by investors or speculators, It is the new buildings where people have come in as speculators and bought multiple units. They’re not being occupied because people don’t want to deal with tenants. Those are the buildings that are the problem.”

CHOA describes itself as a consumer-based non profit that promotes strata property living and the interests of strata property owners. He said there are about 30,000 strata corporations in B.C.

Gioventu said targeting the limited number of potential rentals from strata councils is putting the responsibility of the housing crisis on the back of consumers.

“It’s not really about housing availability,” he said.

“It’s about housing affordability. We won’t get any more units rented because of rental bylaws being lifted.”

Gioventu also estimates that many as 10,000 units have been lost to Airbnb in Metro Vancouver.

“The government is not targeting them because the government is getting a main stream of revenue for PST,” he said.

Comments

We encourage all readers to share their views on our articles and blog posts. We are committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion, so we ask you to avoid personal attacks, and please keep your comments relevant and respectful. If you encounter a comment that is abusive, click the "X" in the upper right corner of the comment box to report spam or abuse. We are using Facebook commenting. Visit our FAQ page for more information.